Monday, February 26, 2007

We just got back from a great weekend in Franklin, Tennessee. We went to Twist and Shout and gave the twisters a special sneak preview of the film. It was so nice to see so many of the cast members and everyone really seemed to love the film. It was nerve wracking to finally screen the film for them - because our lives for the last three years have been so focused on telling their stories. We wanted them to be proud of it! Sara didn't sleep at all the night before the screening (luckily, Naomi retained her ability to sleep any time, anywhere).

As it turned out, the screening couldn't have gone any better. Since many of our main characters don't know each other that well, it was fun to see them sit and talk before the film. When we saw Michele introduce herself to Vera, it was exciting to think of the special bond they share by being a part of the film. Lots of laughter and tears - and a standing ovation! We actually also did a by-request midnight screening for those who missed the film when we showed it during the day.

One of the highlights of the weekend was when we met a woman named Johnna Perry. After the first screening, Johnna introduced herself and offered to fly to Austin for SXSW. She said she and her husband, John, wanted to build a balloon sculpture for us! We couldn't believe it. A few hours later, Johnna returned to tell us she already got all of the balloons for the sculpture donated by Betallic Balloons!

Naomi loved Nashville. So much so that she decided to spend an extra night -when her flight was cancelled!

Thursday, February 22, 2007

This week has been packed with work as we've been going non-stop to get ready for SXSW. Sara came to Boston for the week to contact every single press person going to SXSW. Sleep has definitely become a rarity. Fun news - we got a great publicist for SXSW, David Magdael! He has worked on everything from SPELLBOUND to MAD HOT BALLROOM to WORDPLAY. We also just brought on a sales rep named Roger Kass to help us sell the film. Roger is a smart and funny guy and we've only heard good things about him, so we're excited to have a really strong team!

Our marketing campaign is in full swing now. We made posters, flyers, balloon kits, and really great postcards with balloons slapped to the back. HUGE thanks to all of the people who taped literally thousands of balloons to postcards for us. We even got a class of 4th graders to tape 1,000 balloons for us. Unless, of course, that violates some sort of child labor law. In which case, we were just kidding.

Tuesday, February 20, 2007

TWISTED is FINALLLLLLLLLY done with post! (I really hope we didn't just jinx that). Our post production could best be described as a comedy of errors and worst be described as really bad for our physical and emotional health. Last time - when we said we were done? We were wrong. We had some sync issues - but Sandy from Final Frame was great and helped us fix everything

Saturday, February 10, 2007

TWISTED was in party mode last night to celebrate... finishing post production! Much thanks to everyone who came out to support us. A highlight of the night was when Naomi finally got to meet Todd Rutt, our fantastic graphics guy.

This last two weeks were pretty rough. Very long and stressful days as we did a sound mix and color correction. It was very interesting to see how much can be fixed in post! But - things didn't go too smoothly at first. When we go to color correction - we heard a lot of bad popping noises on our sound mix. We still don't know what happened - but we had to go into crisis mode if we were going to get it fixed in time to lay to HD (which we did Thursday night). If we do say so ourselves, we did a rockin' job of staying calm and finding the right people to help us fix our sound mix. For reasons probably not bloggable - our original sound place didn't step in --- but we found a sound savior - Matt Gill - who stepped in and helped us. It should also be noted, we had a phenomenal colorist - Sandy Patch. Sandy knew what a time crunch we were in and worked to make sure we would be happy with our final product (including helping us with the sound glitches). Part of why we stayed calm was because we knew we were in good hands with Sandy.

It should also be noted that Sandy became quite the little balloon twister while we were there. Everyone loves the latex. As soon as we finished on Thursday night - Sandy announced a dance break. We put on "Celebration" by Kool and the Gang and danced around Sandy's studio as we kissed our tabe dubs. Then, Naomi accidentally kicked over a glass of water (you should see this girl dance!) and it was so funny and somehow appropriate that even our celebratory dance had a minor glitch.

Saturday, February 3, 2007

TWISTED: A Balloonamentary will be making its World Premiere at the South By Southwest Film Festival in Austin, Texas this March!! We're ridiculously excited. Spellbound, our favorite documentary, also premiered at SXSW and we are very proud to follow in their footsteps.

Gimme some Graphics!ELP welcomed Todd Rutt as the new graphics designer for TWISTED. After some back and forth trying to decide a creative way to smooth out transitions and link all our characters together, Todd came up with a great balloony motif. He's worked incredibly hard for us and we are so happy with the outcome! You rock, Todd.

Applying to FestivalsWe've continued applying to festivals around the country...hoping to hear back some good news soon!...

About Me

TWISTED Balloon Dog T-shirts!

Everyone's been asking us so--YES--our super hip balloon dog Tshirts that you've been seeing right here on our blog are now for sale for $20! Please mail a check made out to Eliot Lives Productions along with your size and mailing address and you too can be a member of Team TWISTED!